Starborne

No oceans, no lakes, no rivers, either. A solid landmass from pole to pole. That’s odd, in view of the startlingly high proportion of water vapor in the atmosphere. All that H₂O must condense and precipitate out occasionally, right? There should, in fact, be almost constant rainfall on such a world. Where does that enormous quantity of rain go? Does it all evaporate right back into the cloud layer? Doesn’t it collect anywhere on the surface in the form of large bodies of water?

The sonar probe shows something even odder. The planet is a big ball of rock, extremely skimpy on heavy metals, maybe on metals of any sort. Most of it is just basalt. But the sonar indicates that this world is swaddled in a huge layer of something relatively soft that covers the entire surface, theentire surface, not a break in it anywhere. Vegetable matter, evidently. A planetary jungle. Well, that’s congruent with the climatic and atmospheric figures. But this worldwide layer of vegetable stuff seems to be two or three hundred kilometers thick. That’s quite a thickness. The tallest mountain on Earth is only about nine kilometers high. The idea that this planet is covered by a wrapping of jungle that has roots going down twenty times as deep as Mount Everest is tall is pretty hard to accept.

The people of the Wotan, in the main, are still basking in the warmth of their own expectations about Planet B, which they have been nourishing all during the journey across nospace from the other solar system. For many months now they have been convinced that Planet B is the pot of gold at the end of their rainbow, and until they learn otherwise that is the attitude they are determined to maintain. But those few who have actually been looking at the direct data from Planet B have already understood that those expectations are doomed to be dashed, and they are starting to wonder how their fellow voyagers are going to react to the extreme disappointment that they have set up for themselves.

The year-captain says to Huw, finally, “Do you think the damned place can possibly be of any use to us?”

“Who can tell, unless we go down for a look?”

“I can tell from here. So can you. You know you can.”

Huw acknowledges the point with the most minute of nods. “It seems definitely unusual, I admit.”

“Too hot for us. No useful metals. No free water. Some kind of probably impenetrable jungle covering the whole thing.”

“We’ve come a long way to find it. Are we just going to move along without even sending out a drone probe?” Huw asks.

Once again the year-captain falls into unresponsiveness.

Huw says, “And, truth to tell, a drone probe isn’t what I have in mind. We need to get someone down there and check out Giovanna’s theory about the angels.”

“What theory is that?”

“You don’t remember? That the angels want us to get out of their territory altogether, and so they’ve not only fouled up Noelle’s transmissions but also did that job on Marcus and Giovanna and me when we landed on Planet B.”

The year-captain has locked himself behind some sort of wall and will not come out. “The very existence of these so-called angels is an unproven concept at this point,” he says.

“So it is, old brother. But by landing a couple of people on this planet in front of us, we can at least begin to get some determination of whether it’s going to be possible for us to occupy any planet at all without somehow first obtaining the blessing of these troublesome beings. If they exist, that is. What I’m saying is that if some of us go down there and wedon’t happen to hit the same problems that were encountered on—”

“I know what you’re saying, Huw.”

“We need to go and find out, wouldn’t you agree?”

The year-captain shuts his eyes for a moment. “Who do you propose for such a mission, then?”

“You, of course. Now that you have the legal right to go. And yet you don’t seem to want to, which I confess I can’t understand at all, old brother. You ought to be climbing all over yourself in your hurry to get down there.”

“I want to go, yes. If anyone goes. But the planet is probably useless for our purposes. Is it not a waste of time and perhaps lives to bother looking at it at close range? — Who else would you want to suggest for the mission?”

“Myself.”

“Yes. That goes without saying, Huw. Who else?”

“Nobody else.”

“Just you and me?”

“That’s right, old brother.”

“You argued for the necessity of a three-person expedition to Planet A’s surface,” the year-captain says.